About the High School Huddle

Welcome to the Citizen-Times' constantly-updated blog for Western North Carolina high school sports. Features include breaking news, scores and stats, college recruiting updates and live blogs from some of the marquee games in WNC. Readers are encouraged to comment on posts, but personal attacks on current athletes, coaches and their families will not be tolerated and are subject to edit or removal at the moderator's discretion.

Christ School is out to a commanding lead after Monday’s first round of the two-day NCISAA 3-A golf tournament at the Greensboro Country Club.

The Greenies (292) are eight shots up on second-place Forsyth Country Day (300) and the rest of the field. Christ School is bidding for its first state golf championship since 2010.

Purdue recruit Jeff Krieger shot four-under 68 on Monday, allowing the Greenies senior to take the individual lead in rainy conditions – the tourney was delayed about two hours shortly before noon. Rhyne Jones shot 73, followed by Cory Sciupider (74) and McKay Tye (77).

Former North Buncombe coach Carey Metts famously guaranteed that his football team would beat Pisgah four years ago, a promise that never came to pass.

Now it will be up to a key member of the Haywood County school’s staff to resurrect a Black Hawks program which hasn’t enjoyed a winning season since 2008.

North Buncombe announced Monday morning that Pisgah offensive line/special teams coach Curtis Cagle is its next head coach.

Cagle, 44, had spent the past 15 years with the Black Bears and this will be his first varsity head-coaching position in football. He was formerly Pisgah’s varsity baseball coach.

“I’m very thankful for the opportunity and excited about getting over to North Buncombe and getting started,” Cagle said.

“This is a hungry group of kids and I think it’s going to be a good bunch of kids. I’m looking forward to being their coach.”

Cagle met with North Buncombe’s players for the first time Monday morning. Once he gets settled in, Cagle said he hopes that the Black Hawks will be able to run a variation of Wofford’s option-attack offense.

She struck out 11 batters in Tuesday’s 4-0 win over Pisgah in the finals of the WNCAC tournament and followed that up Friday by blanking Kings Mountain, 11-0, in the first round of the NCHSAA 3-A playoffs. Stanfield was also 5-for-6 at the plate in those games and hit her first homer of the season against Pisgah.

Honorable mention for this week’s award goes to Pisgah’s Micah James and Roberson’s Kassi Butcher and Karley Yeager, who also received votes from Citizen-Times readers.

Pisgah assistant football coach Curtis Cagle has been hired as the next head coach at North Buncombe, the school announced this morning.

Cagle was the offensive line/special teams coach for the Black Bears and replaces Brandon Allen, who went 1-10 in his only season. Allen resigned from North Buncombe in April to become Tuscola’s coach.

The Black Hawks received about 40 applications for their position.

“(Cagle) is well-respected at Pisgah and we think he’s going to do well here,” North Buncombe athletic director Rick High said.

“We believe he’s going to come in here and energize things and get us on the right track.”

The Black Hawks have not enjoyed a winning season since 2008 and have gone a combined 5-28 since then. North Buncombe was the only vacant football coaching job in Western North Carolina.

Since the 2011 season ended in December, the following changes have taken place in WNC:

Saturday was no great epiphany for Buncombe County’s track and field community.

Athletes, coaches and everyone else with a stake in the sport knows how good it is locally.

So there was more pride than surprise after the Asheville High boys (3-A), North Buncombe girls (3-A) and Roberson boys (4-A) all won regional championships.

“This is a phenomenal place to coach,” Roberson boys coach Andrew Devine said.

“You know at the beginning of each season that you’re going to be competing against some of the strongest programs around. And there’s a real camaraderie. It was good to see (Asheville and North Buncombe) win.”

Saturday’s regional-championship was the first for the Roberson boys program at the 4-A level, while North Buncombe’s 3-A girls title was its sixth in the past three years in either track or cross country.

The Asheville boys are only two years removed from their last state championship.

Christ School’s backcourt for the 2012-13 season has been fortified by the transfer of guard Jon Elmore from South Charleston (W. Va.).

Elmore, who is a 6-3 sophomore, averaged 13.6 points a game last winter and was an all-state selection in West Virginia.

Greenies coach David Gaines confirmed that Elmore has enrolled in Arden. His mother’s side of the family has past connections to Christ School – a cousin attended the private school and an uncle was formerly the Greenies’ football coach.

Here are what the next few days look like for Western North Carolina baseball, softball, soccer and tennis teams. Athletic directors and coaches may report game times by sending an e-mail to apearson@citizen-times.com.

East Henderson senior Avery Sneed has committed to play baseball for Catawba Valley Community College.

Sneed batted .418 with 13 RBIs this season for the Eagles (15-9) this past season and had a .500 on-base percentage. Sneed will play baseball this summer for the Henderson County American Legion Post 77 team.